INTERVIEWING ¡FORWARD, RUSSIA! (By Ben Shafran)

Responsible for arguably the best album of 2006 so far (their awesome debut Give Me A Wall) and with the potential to become the most influential Leeds band since Gang Of Four thanks to their label Dance To The Radio, the last 12 months have been every eventful for the boys (and girl) in ¡Forward, Russia!. We caught up with the band before their recent headlining show at the London Garage.

Can you summarise what the last 12 months or so since our first interview have been like for you?

Whiskas (guitar, backing vocals): Been great!
Tom (lead vocals): It’s been really good fun, we’ve done a lot of stuff that we probably never thought we would get to do.

Whiskas: Our album came out…

Rob (bass): We didn’t get signed…

Tom: We’ve been to France…

Katie (drums, backing vocals): We met loads of AA men [everyone laughs].

Whiskas: And we got to do loads of tours, playing with our favourite bands.

Did you ever expect to be doing so well?

Whiskas: We hoped.

Tom: We wanted to, but you never really know how things are going to pan out. I think we still don’t [know]. It’s just nice that things panned out so well. I don’t think we could have asked for more.

Whiskas: It’s really nice being where we are, not pressurised by any bullshit things. We’ve got a gig in a cool venue, decent sized room. I think we’re in a good position.

Rob: I think all of us would have loved to play here when we started, so it’s quite an achievement to be able to play here.

How import is it to be doing it all on your own label?

Whiskas: I think it’s becoming more important in hindsight. I think we’re beginning to realise more and more the stuff we probably wouldn’t have been able to do if we were signed.

Katie: We don’t know whether bands on the labels get the freedom to choose or not.

Rob: You hear a lot of horror stories and stuff of things people have been told by their record label.

Whiskas: It kind of weird, you know, because we never set out to do it this way.

Was there any serious interest from labels?

Everyone: Not in the UK.

Tom: Not at all, they’re all pretty stupid.

Whiskas: Thing is, a lot of the cool labels encouraged us to go it alone, like Mark Bolan at Wichita and Simon Remonde at Bella Union. I don’t know if there was really a big interest, but they became big champions for us anyway.

Do you think in 20 years Dance To The Radio will be viewed in the same way labels like Domino and SubPop are viewed nowadays?

Whiskas: It will be half owned by Sanctuary and half owned by Sony.

Tom: Hopefully it won’t go bust.

Whiskas: I hope it will [be viewed in this way] and I think it might do. The American labels are renowned because they came from a time and a place, which the British labels haven’t really done apart from maybe Postcard [Glasgow-based label that started in the late 70s]. Whereas I think since Dance To The Radio comes from this time – now, in Leeds – makes it more vital. But it might end up [renowned as being] notoriously shit.

Tom: Not with the Pigeons [The Pigeon Detectives].

Whiskas: Yeah, not with the Pigeons on it, they’ll be massive. They’re already bigger than us.

That leads me on to my next question – how do you feel about newer bands on the label having more commercial potential than yourselves and possibly overtaking you in terms of popularity?

Katie: We never thought of ourselves as a commercial band anyway.

Whiskas: In a way it takes the pressure off us being the commercially-drive band on the label. It means we can have more freedom. At the moment, what we do drives the label, which isn’t really pressure but there might be a time when it leads to more pressure. Having more viable bands on the label means the pressure is off us, especially since we’re not that commercial.

Do you think Dance To The Radio can progress without some support from a major label, at the very least a distribution deal?

Whiskas: Yeah, completely. I mean, we are distributed by the people who distributed the fastest selling debut album in British history [Domino Records, distributing the Arctic Monkeys’ debut]. So, you know, you can’t hope for better. If they can do that then they can deal with us.

You wear your trademark exclamation mark shirts to every show, they must get really smelly. Have you each got loads of them?

Rob: They get dirty, definitely on a tour like this with the heat, it’s horrible.

Tom: I think I’ve got like 10 now.

Rob: Have you?

Tom: Yeah.

Rob: Then you’ll be alright.

Katie: I think I’ve got 7 or 8.

Whiskas: I’ve got like 14 because I’ve got Large and Mediums.

Rob: Now we’ve got a merch company we’re alright, but there was a time when we started out…

Tom: Where everyone made one or two each.

Rob: Spray-painted them on.

’Ninteen’ was a huge leap forward for you, is that the sort of direction you want to carry on in?

Tom: Not necessarily.

Whiskas: It was as much a [new] direction as something we’ve been dying to do, to get on with the way we wrote songs. It shows a different aspect of what we do, but I don’t think it’s necessarily a whole change of direction.

Tom: We try not to talk about it [song direction] too much, because then you can cut yourself off from a really good idea by trying to go in a different direction [everyone nods in agreement].

Have you written anything new since the album sessions?

Whiskas: We’re working on some stuff, I think we’re trying to make it sound less like we do at the minute. But you can get too occupied with that.

I think the great thing with doing ‘Nineteen’ is that it gives us a greater scope and confidence, like using electro beats. It sounds stupid but we’ve actually got money now so if we want to try something out we can just go and buy it.

When I interviewed you last year you’ve just finished recording ‘Thirteen’ and you said that you would like to push it further in terms of electronics and so on. Do you feel you’ve achieved that on the album and do you want to push it even further in the future?

Tom: I think we want to push everything that we’ve done further. More of everything!

Whiskas: I think we pushed it to the extreme on the album.

Tom: The electronic album on the album is quite subtle as well, it’s not in-your-face like robots standing there.

Whiskas: Yeah, I was really pleased with the way we managed to layer it in without it being sort of “Ooh! Wow! Ooh look at them!”. Even ‘Nineteen’ had live drums that Tom manipulated in the studio.

What has it been like playing the US and mainland Europe and how do fan reactions compare to the UK?

Whiskas: It’s really weird comparing it because we’ve just grown up in front of people [in Britain].

Tom: Yeah, and over there you’re just going over and playing, and the people are such Anglophiles anyway.

Katie: And every city in America is completely different.

Whiskas: And I think in Europe we tend to get even more extreme.

Rob: We’ve always had good gigs [in Europe].

Whiskas: It’s kind of weird stepping in because I think people who come to see us in Britain, they know our history and they’ve seen us a few times. They’ve seen us when we didn’t have some songs that we play now. Whereas when we go to America – well, anywhere [else] – you’re just going “right, yeah, here we are”, we’re like the finished product.

Tom: You asked us a question about “last time I spoke to you” or about this time last year. When we do interviews in America they don’t think like that, they’re just asking questions about what they’ve got in front of them, which is the album.

What are your overriding memories from Reading and Leeds last year?

Whiskas: Katie being really pissed at Reading [everyone laughs].

Katie: Was it last year when I got wheeled on on the drum raiser?

Everyone: Yeah!

Whiskas: Actually in Leeds the gig was amazing…

Rob: Packed out.

Whiskas: It was packed out. The crew were completely incompetent [everyone laughs] and we did the funniest line check ever.

Katie: Including me line-checking my drums while they [stage crew] pushed me through the curtain on my drum raiser.

Whiskas: It was the first proper gig our sounds guy (who is still with us) did sound for us. All the crew were hassling us and rushing us. I’d play the guitar and Dan [sound engineer] would be speaking to me just going “I can’t hear the guitar”, I’d look down and there will be no mic on it. It was things like that, it was just so funny. And every time we played a line in sound check the crowd cheered.

Rob: And then we got cut short as well.

Everyone: Yeah!

Rob: We only played 5 songs.

Whiskas: The whole thing was completely ridiculous.

Katie: And Reading… didn’t we get to play the whole set?

Everyone: Yeah.

Whiskas: Reading was a lot more relaxed.

Katie: A lot more… blurry [laughs].

Tom: I just remember pulling up behind the Main Stage at Reading and absolute bitch – I don’t know what her name is [leans towards the tape recorder] but if she reads this I hope she dies – coming up to us and shouting “You’re not supposed to be here! What are you doing?!”. We had our passes still on from Leeds and she was like “It is illegal for you to be wearing these passes down here” and I was like “What are you talking about? Any credibility you may have has just gone out of the window with you saying that”.

Whiskas: I just remember walking through the backstage area at Reading and thinking “This is fucking horrible”. It’s like being in a Camden pub with a fucking “hot new band” about to play. Whereas Leeds [backstage] is just full of a lot of people who get drunk in pubs in Leeds. The thing is, the layout for Reading is a lot better than the layout for Leeds. The new layout for Leeds is ridiculous, but the site is fucking a million times nicer.

What are your hopes and expectations for this year’s festivals?

Whiskas: I can’t believe we are playing on that big a stage. We’ve all watched bands like The Futureheads and Bloc Party play those kind of slots over the last few years.

Katie: I think we maybe expected to be first on the Radio 1 Stage, but we’re in the middle. I can’t believe we’re playing that high up.

Whiskas: It’s a really weird lineup I think. I just hope we get the same reaction [as last year], that Leeds doesn’t disappoint.
[Gets distracted by poster for Reading Festival 94 on the wall] …That’s an interesting one – back in the day Reading had a Carlsberg Stage…

Tom: Yeah, I’ve been there. And also, a weekend ticket was £55. I’m sure tickets haven’t increased [in line] with inflation.

Last question, if you were offered a spot on the Kylie tour in 2007, would you take it?

Whiskas: I’ll talk to her about why she thinks we’ll go down well.

Tom: Thing is, you don’t want to show her up, do you?

Rob: So yes, I think we’ll take it.

Tom: We’ll think about it, and then we’ll think how we could get all the dancers on stage with us.

Thanks to ¡Forward, Russia! for taking the time to be interviewed.
¡Forward, Russia! will be playing the NME/Radio 1 Stage at Reading on the Sunday.
All pictures are copyright of Gregory Nolan.